


GhostNotFound

by siilver



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Character Turned Into a Ghost, Dream Team SMP Spoilers, Family Bonding, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Gen, How Do I Tag, Minecraft, POV Clay | Dream (Video Blogging RPF), Post-Manberg-Pogtopia War on Dream Team SMP (Video Blogging RPF), Why Did I Write This?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-02
Updated: 2021-01-02
Packaged: 2021-03-12 09:55:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28508568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/siilver/pseuds/siilver
Summary: Weeks following his dethroning, George runs off into the night without telling anyone of his whereabouts. Ghostbur comes across a new friend and brings him to Dream and Sapnap, who take on the responsibility of helping him recover his memory. Dream juggles rekindling his friendship with the Dream Tram and the arising tensions between L’manburg, as well as his own struggles in his search for Tommy.[[inspired by Lamplight123 ‘s fic ‘Monophobia’ and lovovii ‘s ghost!georgenotfound]]
Kudos: 12





	GhostNotFound

**Author's Note:**

> ghost!george au pog ?? inspired by Lamplight123 ! kudos and comments heavily appreciated <3
> 
> words for this chapter : 2.5k

“dream?”

his voice cut through the silence as easily as a knife, and the hooded figure spun on his heel to meet the owner of the voice, posture tense and hostile. his tension lowered upon realizing it was sapnap, looking terribly disheveled with a twinge of tiredness masking his eyes. he hesitated, mouth parting briefly to reply, however no words left his mouth.

they were in the middle of nowhere. somewhere, but nowhere nonetheless. it was a stretch of snowy taiga near the anarchist’s base and tommy’s area of exile - dream had been searching for tommy, being the only activity that plagued his days - and certainly nowhere near the smp’s land. it was clear sapnap had been looking for him - what else would he be doing this far away? he furrowed his brow, the cold mask upon his face shifting slightly as he allowed himself to relax somewhat, though the ever impending cloud of suspicion in the back of his head refused to leave.

they hadn’t spoken since dream dethroned george. it was terribly clear sapnap held his own hostility for the netherite-clad man, but fatigue and impatience wore away at his bitterness.

dream swallowed. “sapnap? what are you doing out here?”

“i could be asking you the same thing,” the other replied, but seemed to grow tired of this banter quickly and pulled his hand away to reveal the compass. enchantment symbols inscribed in its side suggested its use in finding the nomadic blonde in such an obscure place. he could only wonder where he’d gotten that briefly before the black-haired male continued.

“i was looking for you,” he added, quite obviously. “george is missing. i thought you might have something to do with that.”

surprise stung dream more sharply than the cold. he took in a sharp inhale, before releasing it in rapid succession, his breath billowing from under his mask, the cloud it created visible for a few heartbeats before fading into the frigid air. “george is what?”

sapnap looked as if he were about to accuse him of faking surprise, but instead the aggressive expression spread across his features dropped painstakingly and his face fell. he parted his mouth and said next, rather hopelessly, “so you...you haven’t seen him?” he inquired next, his voice softening. “i thought he would’ve….i thought you would have-“

“you think he would’ve gone to me?” dream interjects, his voice harsher than he intended. the words fall from his mouth before he can stop them, the sharpness catching sapnap off guard. their friendship was taut and fraying, but he didn’t even expect dream to be so brash in this situation. dream clears his throat awkwardly, and tries to dull the edge of his tone before resuming. “he thinks i hate him. i don’t think i’d be the first one he’d turn to. why- why would you-“

“well. i thought it would’ve been nice to let you know. i didn’t think you were going to be so heartless about it.” it was sapnap’s turn to interrupt. his words stung the man in the green hoodie, and he winced, falling silent. sapnap turned to depart, taking a tentative step into his old tracks, dusted lightly with the snowfall. “look, if you don’t want to help, i can go-“

dream jumps to interject again, throwing his dignity out the window with his words. a hand instinctively reached out towards sapnap, as if intending to stop him from leaving physically, but the distance between them is still too far. “no, sap, i didn’t mean it like that,” he begins quickly. the other stops in his tracks, hesitating. “i’m sorry, i...it’s been a while…” he stumbles on his words, and retracts his hand to his neck as he searches for the words. “can we get out of the cold first?”

sapnap didn’t seem too keen on leaving in the first place on that note, and turns slowly to look at dream. a moment passes, and he nods.

dream takes him to the village. not because he was homeless - “i’m nomadic,” he had hissed defensively when inquired about his place of residence - but because his own dwelling was too far away, and others were occupied.

an empty house on the edge of the town was selected, and dream set the bag upon his back down at the door. the click of a flint and steel sent light illuminating the small main room in an orange glow, warmth emitting from the fireplace. dream pretended like he knew the place and sat down in a chair beside the fire. sapnap did the same, looking more fatigued and hopeless than anything.

they sat in the silence for a minute, the painstaking, awkward silence making it apparently clear how estranged their relationship had become. eventually dream cleared his throat and broke the silence. “how’d it happen?” his voice was small, yet still it filled the room easily.

“he...he wandered off two nights ago..” sapnap replied after a moment. he shifted his feet and stared at the fire for a few moments, the flames dancing in his dulled eyes. dream frowned. why hadn’t he told him sooner…? he thought before he could stop himself, and then recalled their rocky friendship in the past few weeks after a few moments. understandable.

“we had an argument. he’d been in a bad mood for weeks...and i guess that just upset him too much..” sapnap swallowed, and let out a crackly laugh, forced and uncomfortable. “it’s stupid, really,” he chuckled painedly, clearly trying to make light of such a terrible situation. “i can’t even remember what the argument was about…”

his sentence tapered off, almost as if being unfinished, and the silence suffocated them again. dream looked to sapnap, trying to determine some feeling of regret welling in his stomach. his lonely weeks had left him questioning the supposed heartlessness his friends had accused him of. it was difficult to tell if he was convincing himself he was guilty, or if he was actually guilty about this.

“we’ll find him,” dream murmured after a moment. “we have to.”

————-

dream had been scouring the land around the village since midnight. sapnap had gone more south towards the land of the smp, though he doubted he’d missed it in his initial searches. it was worth a try, nonetheless.

the sky was painted pink with color as the first signs of dawn peeked over the horizon, the early sun cascading him in morning light. the snow had been flurrying upon him relentlessly over the sleepless night, and it had finally begun to cease as the night came to an end. this only discouraged him further.

dream’s drowsiness certainly took a toll upon him, mentally and physically.

his body ached from traveling so much ground so rapidly - he had just been searching for tommy prior to this, so it’s not as if he were out of practice with searching, but that was different; tommy left terribly obvious clues and had a more narrowed position compared to george.

his mood had soured significantly. he wondered why he even bothered helping sapnap - after all, this was only truly caused by their outrage at his requests. he only dethroned george for his own safety, it was foolish of them to get so mad at him for something that seemed so blatantly clear.

he gave a rather hostile huff at the memory, leaning an arm against the side of a towering spruce tree to rest for a moment. he’d roamed the tundra and the taiga for hours, certainly he deserved a moment of rest. a buzz from his back caused him to remove his communicator, a blocky old thing with frost and cracks crawling up its screen. a message from sapnap.

i’m going to head back. no luck.

an agitated groan echoed into the natural silence, spooking waking animals and disturbing the air around him. all this effort from the both of them. for nothing. he didn’t know why he had helped sapnap. the black-haired teen had clearly wanted nothing to do with him that day he’d removed george’s crown - why now should he help him? now that he was crawling back to him in their time of need?

he cared about them, he knew he did, no matter how angry he was, but he wasn’t too sure if george and sapnap could say the same. and perhaps that was why he questioned his motives so immensely in that moment.

this was futile. he needed to find tommy, and he’d already wasted precious hours, to no avail. perhaps he could find sapnap and-

“hey,” a soft voice interrupted inquisitively. dream perked up at the sound and turned his head to locate the owner of the voice within an instant. “are you lost?”

the voice sounded familiar. slightly hollow, as if standing far away, seemed as if deriving from a male, and a british accent, and-

a yellow sweater and curly brown hair.

“oh.” he hated to sound disappointed, but the other didn’t seem to notice the tone much. “hi, ghostbur.”

the ghastly being smiled at him hopefully. “what are you doing out here, dream?”

“erm, looking for someone. i should be asking you the same thing,” he returned, vaguely.

“oh, i had someone i thought you might want to meet!” the ghost chided cheerfully, and turned his head to the left towards a nearby tree. his hand outstretched and he moved to the side to bring the being in question into view. shock slammed into dream like a heavy wave.

“george…?”

“oh, the mask looks familiar,” the ghostly george mentioned to ghostbur, pointing at the engraved white disc upon dream’s face. he looked to dream next, and tilted his head slightly. “do i know you?”

his voice sounded so empty. as if speaking through an empty container. he hadn’t heard his voice in so long and...was it even his? he pushed the thought away. it took him a moment to process that george was a ghost now. he had died. he was dead. he cleared his throat and said, voice small, “you did.”

ghostbur looked terribly sympathetic, and george looked more confused than anything. he’d been averting his gaze from the ghost most of the time, but he took a moment to realize there was something off about his appearance. he appeared staticky, glitchy almost. his features seemed to be flickering with the effect, some squares of his appearance shifting from their intended spot. exactly like a glitching avatar.

dream frowned, but decided to leave it at that. he turned and beckoned for them to follow with a wave of his hand. “let’s go back, sapnap will be…” he hesitated. he’d gone for the normal phrase of ‘happy to see you’, but he doubted it. finding the ghost of one of your best friends wasn’t anything to be happy about. he said it anyways. “...happy to see you again.”

he tread through the snow, ghostbur levitating behind him with george in tow, like a pitiful line of ducklings. the sun had mounted into the sky, nearing mid-morning, when they returned to the village. dream pushed open the door to the house he and sapnap had resided in during that night, and found that the other was already there.

he looked so defeated and tired, dream almost pitied him in that instant. the black-haired one only lifted his gaze from his feet to glance at dream as he entered, before flickering back down them up again in surprise. george came into view, and sapnap sprung up to greet him with a hug.

“george!”

only when he had wrapped his arms around the bewildered spirit did he realize what was wrong. the outline of george’s figure buzzed at the contact. he didn’t remove himself from the embrace, though george didn’t return it, and watched as surprise bloomed across his face. sapnap was the first to let go.

dream stood, leaning against a wall, and ghostbur came to join him after marveling at the fire for a moment.

“george..? you’re-“ his visage had been painted with pure joy until this, where it now resumed that pained look. “you’re a ghost…?”

george’s face remained expressionless. “who are you..?”

sapnap’s eyes were misted, as though blooming with tears that threatened to spill over. he blinked and they disappeared. he sat down again, dejected. “i’m...i’m sapnap. you don’t remember me?”

“the headband,” ghostbur called softly from beside dream.

“oh.” george looked to sapnap’s forehead, and dream presumed he was remembering people due to specific objects of significance. that explained his comment to ghostbur about his mask. he hesitated, and scratched the back of his head awkwardly. “...i remember you vaguely.”

sapnap heaved a sigh, then looked to ghostbur. “where’d you find him..?” he inquired, hesitant as if fearing he would then know george’s cause of death.

“in the snow. i’m not sure what caused his death, though,” ghostbur replied, cheerfully even amongst such a topic. “it was too snowy to locate any blood. i got ghostgog out from there.”

“ghostgog?” george echoed faintly.

“ghosts take on new names to make it less confusing!” the yellow-clad ghost chirped in reply. “i came up with that one on the spot, so it might need to be reevaluated.”

george nodded hesitantly. the silence enveloped the room again, understandably so; dream was exhausted, sapnap was processing, george was more than confused, and ghostbur wasn’t quite sure what all the tension was for.

ghostbur was the first to break it. “well, i think we ought to be on our way again,” he said, marking the end of this interaction. we? dream noted silently. his suspicions were confirmed as rapidly as they were produced, and ghostbur extended a hand to george as he headed towards the door.

“you’re leaving with him?” sapnap interjected, surprise clearly weighing in his tone.

the older ghost looked at him with a tilt of his head, as if wondering why he were so shocked at this. “well, i thought it would’ve been best since we’re both ghosts,” he explained. it was reasonable, but he had the same feeling of responsibility of sapnap pushing at his shoulders.

“we should take care of it ourselves, ghostbur,” dream replied. “you can go back to technoblade or wherever you stay now. we’ll handle it.” it came out more passive-aggressively than intended, but he was far too tired to fix it.

ghostbur didn’t waste time looking hurt, and only gave a nod. a polite chorus of goodbyes followed, and the ghost departed, leaving the trio alone in their room.

sapnap looked as if he were about to bombard george with more questions - he’d been closer with george in the recent weeks, and dream wasn’t feeling too talkative to begin with - but the one in the green hoodie cut himself off before he could even begin to speak, with a dismissive wave of his hand.

he began towards the door. “we should get out of this place first. back to the smp?”


End file.
